Requirements

Rufus utility in order to create an Ubuntu Desktop bootable USB drive compatible with UEFI motherboards.

Create Free Space on Windows for Ubuntu Install

On a pre-installed machine with a single Windows 10 partition, you need to create some free space in Windows partition in order to install Ubuntu 18.04.

First login to the system using an account with administrator privileges, open a Command Prompt window with admin rights and execute diskmgmt.msc command to open Disk Management utility.

diskmgmt.msc

Select the Windows partition, usually C: volume, right click on this partition and select Shrink Volume option in order to reduce the partition size.

Windows Disk Management Utility

Wait for the system to collect partition size data, add the desired amount of space you want to shrink and hit in Shrink button. After the shrink process completes, a new unallocated space will be present in your drive. We’ll use this free space to install Ubuntu alongside Windows 10.

New Windows Partition for Ubuntu Install

Install Ubuntu 18.4 Alongside with Windows

On the next step, place Ubuntu Desktop DVD ISO image or the bootable USB stick into the appropriate motherboard drive and, reboot the machine and hit the appropriate bootable key ((usually F12, F10 or F2) in order to boot the Ubuntu installer DVD or USB bootable image.

On the first installation screen select Install Ubuntu and hit Enter key to start the installation process.

Select Install Ubuntu

In the ”Welcome” screen, select your installation language and hit on Continue button.

Select Ubuntu Installation Language

On the next screen, select the keyboard layout for your system and hit on Continue button.

Select Ubuntu Keyboard Layout

In the next installation screen, choose Normal installation and hit on Continue button. In this screen you also have the option to perform a Minimal installation of Ubuntu Desktop, which includes only some basic system utilities and a web browser.

You can also turn off Secure Boot option, if this option is enabled in motherboard UEFI settings in order to install third-party software for graphic card, Wi-Fi or additional media formats. Be aware that turning off Secure Boot option requires a password.

Select Ubuntu Install Type

Next, In Installation type menu, choose Something else option in order to manually partition the hard disk and hit on Continue button.

Ubuntu Manual Partition

In hard disk partition table menu, select the hard drive free space and hit on + button in order to create the Ubuntu partition.

Select Ubuntu Install Drive

In the partition pop-up window, add the size of the partition in MB, choose the partition type as Primary and the partition location at the Beginning of this space.

Next, format this partition with ext4 filesystem and use / as partition mount point. The /(root) partition summary is described below:

Size = minimum 30000 MB recommended

Type for the new partition = Primary

Location for the new partition = Beginning of this space

Use as = EXT4 journaling file system

Mount point = /

Create Ubuntu Root Partition

After completing this step, hit on OK button to return to disk utility. Other partitions, such as /home or Swap are optional in Ubuntu Desktop and should be created only for special purposes.

However, if you still want to add a home partition, select free space, hit on + button and use the below scheme to create the partition.

In this guide we’ll install Ubuntu alongside Windows 10 with only the /(root) partition set. After you’ve created the required root partition on the disk, select Windows boot Manager as device for the boot loader installation and hit on Install Now button.

Select Ubuntu Boot Manager

In the pop-up window, hit on Continue button in order to commit the changes that will be written to disk and start the installation.

Confirm Ubuntu Partition Changes

On the next screen, select your location from the provided map and hit on Continue button.

Select Your Country Location

Next, insert your name, the name of your desktop, a username with a strong password and choose the option with ‘Require my password to log in’. When you finish, hit on Continue button and wait for the installation process to complete.

Create Ubuntu User Account

During the installation process, a series of screens which describe Ubuntu Desktop and the installation progress bar will be displayed on your screen. You cannot interfere with the installation process in this final stage.

Ubuntu Installation Progress

After the installation completes, eject the installation medium and hit on Restart now button in order to reboot the machine.

Ubuntu Installation Finishes

After reboot, the system should boot into GNU GRUB menu. In case the GRUB menu is not displayed, restart the machine, go to motherboard UEFI settings and change boot order or Boot Options->BBS priority.

The settings to enable GRUB menu highly depends on your machine motherboard UEFI settings. You should consult motherboard documentation in order to identify the settings that need to be changed in order to display GRUB menu.

Ubuntu Boot Grub Menu

Finally, login to Ubuntu 18.04 Desktop with the credentials configured while installing the system and follow the initial Ubuntu welcome screen in order to start using Ubuntu Desktop.

13 Responses

I’d like to create an encrypted /(root) partition, even without LVM (I don’t necessarily need LVM, do I?) You say, “select Windows boot Manager as device for the boot loader installation and hit on Install Now button.”

My Windows 10 EFI partition is a mere 100 MBs on my machine which seems way too small for kernal updates. Could I/should I create an unencrypted /boot, of 500 MBs or so, before encrypting the /(root) partition or could I/should I increase the size of the Windows EFI partition and name it /boot/efi (or whatever the proper naming path).

I’m assuming the /boot in your instructions is a part of the /(root) partition and is installed, of course, unencrypted on the /(root) partition along with /home, page file, etc, so it can be found by the boot loader and mounted and also be update with new kernals.

I suppose almost all hope is lost in creating a UEFI encrypted external portable drive (I did see a complicated set of instruction for creating an external portable Ubuntu UEFI though). I’ve encrypted many machines in various ways over the years: Windows XP or Vista encrypted with TrueCrypt with Ubuntu encrypted native on my computers in dual boot with /boot sometimes installed on a removable USB.

If I can’t find a suitable solution I’m either going to have encrypt Win.10 with VeraCrypt or say, “bugger Windows” and install Ubuntu as my only and fully encrypted OS on this new computer.

I want to configure Ubuntu to have /home on a separate partition. What size do I need to make the partition that will contain the root stuff (i.e mount point /)? I will have a total of 500GiB available space.